Montclair Eats

Azora 407 Bloomfield Ave.
Montclair, NJ
973-233-9400Azora is the sort of Japanese place you really want to like. It may be one of the nicest dining rooms in Montclair. We really wanted to like the food and we really wanted to like our experience but we were left wanting more.Read More about Azora

Daruma
4 Alvin Place
Montclair, NJ
973-783 -5680
Ah, there’s is nothing quite like the hibachi grill on a Friday evening. If you like kids of course and lots of them. That was pretty much the scene over at Daruma when we stopped in for a little take out.More about Daruma

Fascino
331 Bloomfield Ave.
Montclair, NJ, 07042,
973-233-0350
www.fascinoresteaurant.com
We always seem to end up at Fascino in Montclair for special occasions and I got to wonderng about why that is. The food is great, but there are a lot of great places in the area, as evidenced by this blog. What I think sets Fascino apart is the atmosphere. It’s not just the food, it’s the atmosphere stupid.More about Fascino

Joe Bartonis deli has been a welcome addition to the neighborhood near Valley and Walnut Streets. In its short time there it has become a go to shop for not only sandwiches and pizza but homemade Italian pastas like gnocchi and linguine.More about Joe Bartonis

Ethnic food in Montclair is a bit like driving up Claremont Avenue, there are a lot of stops and plenty of time to look around. There are dining establishment with everything from sushi to Ethiopian to Cuban cuisine and everything in between, but one of the best and most consistent spots in town is Lalezar, at Turkish restaurant tucked away on the western slope of Bloomfield Ave.More about Lalezar

Marrakech708 Bloomfield Avenue
Montclair, NJ 07042-2203
Conspicuously missing from Montclair’s dining scene is a solid Moroccan restaurant so I was thoroughly excited when I saw the sign for Marrakech going up along the western slope of Bloomfield Ave. a few months ago.More about Marrakech

Mesob515 Bloomfield Ave.
Montclair, NJ
973-655-9000www.mesobresteurant.com
Sitting smack in the middle of Montclair’s main restaurant drag near the corner of Park and Bloomfield is one of the more exotic meal locations in North Jersey, Mesob. A mellow dinning room featuring fine Ethiopian stews and a friendly staff.More about Mesob

Sesame
400 Bloomfield Ave.
Montclair, NJ, 07042
973-746-2553www.sesamerestaurant.com
Boasting a red brick interior and two-tiered dining hall, Sesame has the look and feel of an Italian restaurant. It sits in the same building as the historic Roberts Wellmont Theater and you can see attention has been paid to maintain the same historic feel.More about Sesame

Everyone has their favorite sushi place. I could sing the praises of Sushi Hana’s Boston Roll but if you like the falvor and style of some of Nori’s fruit and fish inspired rolls I won’t be able to convince you otherwise. Like Pizza, there a thin crust people and deep dish people.More about Sushi Hana

Table 8 615 Bloomfield AveMontclair, NJ 07042
We had the good fortune a few weeks ago to get a seat at Table 8 which is a little more than a year old making it a quasi-veteran of the scene. Perhaps it’s the location just before the Bloomfield Ave. slope that keeps this place on the down-low but it certainly should not be the food.More about Table 8

Toast700 Bloomfield Ave.
Montclair, NJ, 07042
973-509-8099
Deciding not to compete with its more exotic brothers on the block, Toast serves breakfast, lunch and brunch on a menu that is long on variations of traditional American breakfast fare.More about Toast

Trattoria Rustica
577 Bloomfield Ave.
Montclair NJ
Trattoria Rustica serves a variety of Italian fare in a clean and inviting environment. We checked it out this past weekend with high expectations that were mostly met.More about Trattoria Rustica

Tuptim
600 Bloomfield Ave.
Montclair, NJ, 07042
973-783-3800
There’s an ongoing debate about the best Thai food in Montclair with lines split pretty evenly between Tuptim and quasi-chain Thai Chef. Tuptim for my two cents is the lesser of the two when it comes to noddles and is a bit more hit and miss. It’s good but the great shakes are few and far between.More about Tuptim

There’s nothing quite better than take out on a cold, winter night heading into a long weekend so ordering from Villa Victoria last Friday was a no brainer. There’s no ambiance at the pizza place on Park St. in Montclair. Just down the street from the YMCA and across the street from Mexicali Rose, there’s no place in the place so take out or pick up is the main means to an end.More about Villa Victoria

We broke the Bloomfield Avenue bubble this Memorial Day weekend and ventured over to the much quieter Watchung Plaza section of town. There are a few shops and restaurants mainly in the two blocks east of the train station but not much in the way of nightlife.Read More about Yoshi

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3 Responses to “Montclair Eats”

Hey, it’s too bad you can knock a really good restaurant like AZORA in Montclair and have it come up as part of the top 4 searches in the web when one types AZORA into GOOGLE. Crowded little restaurants are the norm in the area and giving a great one “bad buzz” isn’t cool at all.If you cant take a little waiting then why not move out into the country where there aren’t any people. Bringing up your husbands Cashew allergies as an excuse to make a bad remark about a good restaurant is pretty trite. I am sure that his allergy is important to him but to have it contribute to being possibly the only thing someone using a search engine reads and makes a dining experience decision upon is a little over the top. The web is a pretty powerful

Paul,
Thanks for the comment. Hopefully your thoughts will counter ours across the Web.

What can we say? We came to Azora, we ate, we weren’t that impressed with the food or the service. We know there are a lot of people who love the place, which is perhaps why we were a bit disappointed. We tend to cut the restaurants we write about a lot of slack so maybe it was an off night.

As for Google. Glad to know this little blog is flying up the rankings and if we knew the mysteries behind Google’s algorithms we’d be much richer than we are today.

As the above mentioned sufferer of a cashew allergy I can tell you it’s not just an excuse to make a bad comment. When I go into a restaurant I rely on the waiter or waitress to know what is in their food and how it is prepared. If they don’t know that’s fine as long as they check. If they don’t know and don’t check it could mean a trip to the hospital and a closed throat for me. By law it is part of their job to be able to inform me as long as I make them aware of my allergy. Therefore if they are unaware of the ingredients they use and dont’ bother to find out, they are not paying enough attention to their customer’s needs. This is especially true in an Asian restaurant since they use lots of nuts in their foods.